MOST POPULAR ARTICLES OF THE MONTH

Editor's Note

In 1999 I had the unique opportunity to work as an Eckerd Patient Care Pharmacist. We had a grant to see how much impact we could have on patient care as a pharmacist. There were 15 of us across the country who were trained to manage patients full time. I would rotate between 3 pharmacies and work with patients to improve their health.

Since I was interested in diabetes it was only natural that those were the patients I had most of the time. Two of the pharmacies were in areas with large Spanish populations and I felt I would be more respectful if I learned how to talk about diabetes in Spanish.

After a few months I was able to carry on a conversation and when I ran into problems one of the pharmacists in the store who spoke Spanish would help me out. Knowing the language helped me learn another valuable lesson, the lesson of medication adherence. The more I worked with these patients, the more frustrated I got when I saw their compliance reports. I did not know what to do to improve the rates.

That is when a Cuban pharmacist told me that older Spanish men look at taking medications as a sign of weakness and I would have a hard battle to fight.

Seventeen years later, our publisher, Steve Freed, sat down with Dr Osama Hamdy at the AACE meeting, and they discussed this very topic. Click here to see what Steve found out about the cultural issues that impact diabetes treatments.

Dave Joffe

Editor-in-chief

DISASTERS AVERTED — Near Miss Case Studies

Female, 57 years of age, type 2 diabetes, metformin 1,000mg twice daily for 12 years, came in with weakness, anemia, tingling of fingers and toes. Her A1C had always been below 7%. Some in my office thought she had developed diabetic peripheral neuropathy. I could not disagree, but I also knew metformin can cause vitamin B12 deficiency.

EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW — Candid Video Interviews with Top Practitioners

In part 1 of this Exclusive Interview, Dr. Osama Hamdy talks with Diabetes in Control Publisher Steve Freed during the AACE 2017 convention in Austin, Texas about the cultural issues that impact diabetes treatment and the importance of factoring in cultural differences.

CLINICAL GEMS — The Best from Diabetes Texts

Diet and lifestyle modification: Appropriate lifestyle interventions involving diet and exercise can lead to weight loss, and since obesity is a major contributor to the IR and T2DM, weight loss should provide significant benefits to individuals with these problems. The Diabetes Prevention Program demonstrated that a 6% weight loss and the addition of two hours of exercise per week was associated with a 58% reduction in the incidence of new T2DM in a group with IGT. Similar results were obtained in the Finnish Diabetes Prevention Study using similar interventions.

MOST POPULAR ARTICLES OF THE MONTH

Make no mistake: sitting less time overall is a good idea for myriad health reasons, but is sitting as bad for you as some would suggest? Is it really the new smoking? In 2017 alone, a slew of new research studies has looked at various health detriments associated with prolonged sitting, even in adults who exercise regularly.

MOST POPULAR ARTICLES OF THE MONTH

In 1999 I had the unique opportunity to work as an Eckerd Patient Care Pharmacist. We had a grant to see how much impact we could have on patient care as a pharmacist. There were 15 of us across the country who were trained to manage patients full time. I would rotate between 3 pharmacies and work with patients to improve their health.

Since I was interested in diabetes it was only natural that those were the patients I had most of the time. Two of the pharmacies were in areas with large Spanish populations and I felt I would be more respectful if I learned how to talk about diabetes in Spanish.

After a few months I was able to carry on a conversation and when I ran into problems one of the pharmacists in the store who spoke Spanish would help me out. Knowing the language helped me learn another valuable lesson, the lesson of medication adherence. The more I worked with these patients, the more frustrated I got when I saw their compliance reports. I did not know what to do to improve the rates.

That is when a Cuban pharmacist told me that older Spanish men look at taking medications as a sign of weakness and I would have a hard battle to fight.

Seventeen years later, our publisher, Steve Freed, sat down with Dr Osama Hamdy at the AACE meeting, and they discussed this very topic. Click here to see what Steve found out about the cultural issues that impact diabetes treatments.

Female, 57 years of age, type 2 diabetes, metformin 1,000mg twice daily for 12 years, came in with weakness, anemia, tingling of fingers and toes. Her A1C had always been below 7%. Some in my office thought she had developed diabetic peripheral neuropathy. I could not disagree, but I also knew metformin can cause vitamin B12 deficiency.

In part 1 of this Exclusive Interview, Dr. Osama Hamdy talks with Diabetes in Control Publisher Steve Freed during the AACE 2017 convention in Austin, Texas about the cultural issues that impact diabetes treatment and the importance of factoring in cultural differences.

Diet and lifestyle modification: Appropriate lifestyle interventions involving diet and exercise can lead to weight loss, and since obesity is a major contributor to the IR and T2DM, weight loss should provide significant benefits to individuals with these problems. The Diabetes Prevention Program demonstrated that a 6% weight loss and the addition of two hours of exercise per week was associated with a 58% reduction in the incidence of new T2DM in a group with IGT. Similar results were obtained in the Finnish Diabetes Prevention Study using similar interventions.

Make no mistake: sitting less time overall is a good idea for myriad health reasons, but is sitting as bad for you as some would suggest? Is it really the new smoking? In 2017 alone, a slew of new research studies has looked at various health detriments associated with prolonged sitting, even in adults who exercise regularly.